“Many patients with heart problems – such as heart disease or angina – may need to undergo cardiac surgery in order to restore or improve blood flow. But a new study suggests that the procedure may offer so much more; stem cells in fat discarded during cardiac surgery could be injected back into the patient’s heart to further improve its function.” – Beyond the Dish ‘Heart Function Improved by Injecting Discarded Surgery Fat’

So it looks like Tyler Durden (from Fight Club) was right… kind of. There is a better use for that unwanted, liposuctioned belly fat than just being toxic waste. Scientists have discovered that the belly fat that many of us have (that we really don’t want or need) can be used to improve the functionality of our hearts. This procedure would require liposuction pre-cardiac-surgery, however, scientists are looking into the possibility of using similar fat that builds up around the heart that, conveniently, is removed during the surgery anyway. Wam-Bam-Thank you ma’am

This seems only too fitting, as many young people experiencing cardiac distress may be experiencing it because they have a good amount of this fat to spare. Well, fret no more, because what doesn’t kill us does make us stronger.

All jokes aside this does seem like the circle of life modernized. The fat that could be killing us can be used to save us once it has already begun to kill us. Make sense? No? Well think of it this way… While surgeons are inside of someone’s chest trying to save them from a heart attack, they are also removing excess fat from around the heart– which is part of the reason this person is in this situation to begin with. In the near future doctors may be able to, in one surgery, remove this fat, isolate the stem cells, and inject them back into the heart to have a positive effect post surgery. This could increase blood flow out of the left ventricle and result in “greater ventricular movement”. So the fat that is hurting our heart can now be removed and the stem cells in it put back with basically the opposite effect it had originally. But in the mean time, it seems very likely that we will be able to save some of that liposuctioned fat and use it during cardiac surgery to improve heart function.

Famous for its antioxidant properties and role in tissue repair, vitamin C is touted as beneficial for illnesses ranging from the common cold to cancer and perhaps even for slowing the aging process. Now, a study published online on December 24th by Cell Press in the journal Cell Stem Cell uncovers an unexpected new role for this natural compound: facilitating the generation of embryonic-like stem cells from adult cells.

Over the past few years, we have learned that adult cells can be reprogrammed into cells with characteristics similar to embryonic stem cells by turning on a select set of genes. Although the reprogrammed cells, called induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), have tremendous potential for regenerative medicine, the conversion is extremely inefficient.

“The low efficiency of the reprogramming process has hampered progress with this technology and is indicative of how little we understand it. Further, this process is most challenging in human cells, raising a significant barrier for producing iPSCs and serious concerns about the quality of the cells that are generated,” explains senior study author Dr. Duanqing Pei from the South China Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine at the Guangzhou Institutes of Biomedicine and Health, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Dr. Pei and colleagues measured the production of reactive oxygen species or ROS during reprogramming and discovered a potential link between high ROS and low reprogramming efficiency. They became particularly interested in antioxidants, hypothesizing that they might suppress ROS and cell senescence, which seems to be a major roadblock for the generation of iPSCs.

The researchers found that adding vitamin C, an essential nutrient that is abundant in citrus fruits, enhanced iPSC generation from both mouse and human cells. Vitamin C accelerated gene expression changes and promoted a more efficient transition to the fully reprogrammed state. Somewhat to their surprise, they found that other antioxidants do not have the same effect, but vitamin C does seem to act at least in part through slowing cell senescence.

“Our results highlight a simple way to improve iPSC generation and provide additional insight into the mechanistic basis of reprogramming,” concludes Dr. Pei. “It is also of interest that a vitamin with long-suspected anti-aging effects has such a potent influence on reprogramming, which can be considered a reversal of the aging process at the cellular level. It is likely that our work may stimulate further research in this area as well.”

“i have been doing manual labor with my dads company the heart is doing well im getting in better shape every week.

im to the piont now i can carry 5 gallon buckets of concrete up hills lol, pretty cool still

in a few days it will be my 6 year anniversary and still no reversion!!”

2006

Case Study: James Eilert, 34 years old, presents with a “widowmaker” [100 % blockage of the left ascending coronary artery]. His ejection fraction (EF – volume of blood his heart pumps out) was between 20 and 25 percent(55 is normal). His cardiologist told him he has about 5 years left to live. James left the country in order to receive Adult Stem Cell treatment.

6 months after treatment – Sidewalls of heart beat normally. Septum went from 100% damage to 30% damage. Cardiologist confirms James’ heart is 50 percent more elastic than the year before Repair Stem Cell therapy.

6 – 9 months after treatment – James’ total dead heart tissue is down to about 10%. EF is up to 50%!

4 years later – James’ heart and health continue to improve. He continues to push himself and his limits. He runs regularly, works 7 days a week and can bike 20 miles .

Summation:

James went from Class III congestive heart failure to Class I with an ejection fraction (EF) increase from ~20-25% to his current EF of 50%. His doctors have lifted all restrictions and limitations on his physical activities.

James is only one of many adult stem cell treatment success stories…

November 17, 2011 Update:

A letter from James. How is he doing today?

“its amazing how fast reality can change, the differences that you see in others that they dont notice themselves. the changes in attitudes and perceptions that the “new” was never in doubt and is accepted as if it were always true. the new studies showing the truth about adult stem cell heart treatments the last few months have proven that we the few pioneers that have made huge financial sacrifices to try and save our lives were not crazy, stupid or otherwise deluded!

it was a risk and for the last four years despite proving over and over by running uphill on so many treadmills my improvments were basically ignored by cardiologists, general practitioners, and even my own wife and stepdaughters.

that i am happy to say has changed!!!!

i went to see my doctor yesterday, he told me to start heavy weight training and interval running, to help me lose weight better. what was differnet? nobody has told me to do that since my heart attack, there was no mention of taking it easy, in fact before i was told to only do light weights and take it easy, watch my heart rate, dont push past 150bpm ever.

it was like i never even had a heart attack.

i asked in disbelief if i should watch my heart rate, keep it a safe zone. the answer “no, stick to 85 to 90 percent and youll be fine, your exercise scores and echos show you can handle it”

vindication, no longer an unexplained anamoly, just a patient that responded better than average to a new treatment – like it was always true in thier minds, never a doubt.

what a feeling!! it has taken ten years to go from the “fringe” to the mainstream - i look forward to getting treatments here in america, and i’m so happy i took the risk that now ensures i will be alive to reap the benifits when it becomes available here!

have a good day david – it nice to be right once in a while!
jim eilert

Congratulations as always Jim! On your heart recovery success and on having the courage to be a pioneer with an adult stem cell treatment that was cutting edge around the world 5 years ago and is still barely know today in the USA! – David

This makes me crazy. Thousands, maybe tens of thousands treated to date successfully with studies going back to 2002 and they call this brand new study pioneering? Consider the triple blind study protocol used:

The odds are not in his favor to even get the treatment. It’s time to catch up to the rest of the world. – DG

DeBary man takes part in pioneering stem cell study

Dr. David Henderson, left, talks to his patient Robert Anderson, 64, of DeBary recently at Florida Hospital Memorial Medical Center in Daytona Beach. Anderson is participating in a clinical research trial that uses a patient’s own stem cells to regenerate cardiovascular tissue. He was the first patient to enroll in the clinical study that started in December at Cardiology Research Associates of Florida Hospital Memorial Medical Center.

Published: Monday, February 18, 2013 at 5:30 a.m.

Last Modified: Sunday, February 17, 2013 at 5:41 p.m.

DAYTONA BEACH — At 44, Robert Anderson’s career as a chemical engineer was cut short due to pain in his chest and jaw.

A few years earlier doctors had performed bypass surgery on Anderson to repair the deteriorating muscle around his heart. Like 850,000 Americans, Anderson suffers from angina, which causes chest discomfort due to coronary heart disease.

But the surgery was a temporary fix for Anderson, whose diabetes worsened his heart condition. As the pain in his jaw and chest increased when he walked, the DeBary resident was forced into early retirement.

For the past 20 years, Anderson’s life has been limited by his heart condition, which has only worsened.

With no surgical options left, Anderson is hoping his participation in a clinical research trial that uses a patient’s own stem cells to regenerate cardiovascular tissue will improve his quality of life. Some patients taking part in the study also were injected with a placebo…

During an attack, the heart remodels itself and dilates around the site of the injury to try to compensate, but these repairs are rarely effective. If the attack does not kill you, heart failure later frequently will. “No matter what other clinical interventions are available, heart transplantation is the only genuine cure for this,” says Paul Riley, professor of regenerative medicine at Oxford University. “The problem is there is a dearth of heart donors.” Transplants have their own problems – successful operations require patients to remain on toxic, immune-suppressing drugs for life and their subsequent life expectancies are not usually longer than 20 years. The solution, emerging from the laboratories of several groups of scientists around the world, is to work out how to rebuild damaged hearts. Their weapons of choice are reprogrammed stem cells.

These researchers have rejected the more traditional path of cell therapy that you may have read about over the past decade of hope around stem cells – the idea that stem cells could be used to create batches of functioning tissue (heart or brain or whatever else) for transplant into the damaged part of the body. Instead, these scientists are trying to understand what the chemical and genetic switches are that turn something into a heart cell or muscle cell. Using that information, they hope to program cells at will, and help the body make repairs.

It is an exciting time for a technology that no one thought possible a few years ago. In 2007, Shinya Yamanaka showed it was possible to turn adult skin cells into embryonic-like stem cells, called induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), using just a few chemical factors.

His technique radically advanced stem cell biology, sweeping aside years of blockages due to the ethical objections about using stem cells from embryos. He won the Nobel prize in physiology or medicine for his work in October. Researchers have taken this a step further – directly turning one mature cell type to another without going through a stem cell phase.

At Oxford, Riley has spent almost a year setting up a lab to work out how to get heart muscle to repair itself. The idea is to expand the scope of the work that got Riley into the headlines last year after a high-profile paper published in the journal Nature in which he showed a means of repairing cells damaged during a heart attack in mice. That work involved in effect turning the clock back in a layer of cells on the outside of the heart, called the epicardium, making adult cells think they were embryos again and thereby restarting their ability to repair.

During the development of the embryo, the epicardium turns into the many types of cells seen in the heart and surrounding blood vessels. After the baby is born this layer of cells loses its ability to transform. By infusing the epicardium with the protein thymosin β4 (Tβ4), Riley’s team found the once-dormant layer of cells was able to produce new, functioning heart cells. Overall, the treatment led to a 25% improvement in the mouse heart’s ability to pump blood after a month compared with mice that had not received the treatment.

Riley says finding ways to replace damaged cells via transplantation, the dominant research idea for more than a decade, has faltered. Scientists have tried out a variety of adult stem cells – derived from areas such as bone marrow, muscle and fat – turned them into heart cells and transplanted them into animal models, which initially showed good results. But those results could never be repeated in humans with the same degree of success. “In humans, moving into clinical trials, the actual benefit, from a meta-analysis just on bone-marrow-derived cells, is a meagre 3% improvement,” he says. “That’s barely detectable clinically and unfortunately isn’t going to make a vast amount of difference to your overall quality of life.” The original impression from rodent studies was that the transplanted cells would become new muscle and contribute to improving damaged areas, but Riley says that idea has fallen out of favour. “All they do, if anything at all, is to secrete factors that will help the heart sustain the injury, rather than necessarily offer long-term regeneration.”

That is where the reprogrammers get going. Find the chemical factors that will make a cell (a skin cell, say, or a piece of scar tissue) think it is in the womb, so it switches certain genes on and others off and becomes a new heart cell, and you can avoid the large-scale transplant altogether. All you need is an infusion of the right drugs and resident cells will do all the required repair work.

The process requires an understanding of how an embryo develops and what cues nature uses to grow all the body’s cell types from just a sperm and an egg. This ability to regenerate does not quite stop at birth: injure a one-day-old mouse’s heart, for example, and it will completely regenerate. Injure it again after a week and the heart will scar. “Within seven days, it goes from completely repairable to the adult wound-healing default position,” says Riley. “We want to understand what happens during that window.”

Many scientists believe the secrets of how to regenerate tissue are linked with an understanding of how to reverse the ageing process. Saul Villeda, of the University of California, presented work at the recent annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in New Orleans where he showed that blood from young mice reversed some of the effects of ageing in older mice, improving learning and memory to a level comparable with much younger animals. Older mice had an increased number of stem cells in their brains and there was a 20% increase in connections between brain cells.

Though his work is yet to be published in a peer-reviewed journal, Villeda speculated the young blood was likely to be working in the older mice by increasing levels of chemical factors that tend to decline as animals get older. Bring these back, he says, and “all of a sudden you have all of these plasticity and learning and memory-related genes that are coming back”.

Prof Deepak Srivastava has already transformed scar-forming cardiac cells in mice into beating heart cells, inside living animals, using a set of chemical factors. His results were published last April in Nature. “We’ve redeployed nature’s own toolkit in these cells to convert non-muscle cells that are in the heart into new muscle. More than half of the cells in the heart are not muscle [but] architectural cells called fibroblasts that are meant to support the muscle,” he says.

“We had the idea that if we could somehow fool those cells into thinking that they should become muscle, then we have a vast reservoir of cells that already exist within the organ that might be able to be called upon to regenerate the heart from within.”

He injected three chemical factors – called Gata4, Mef2c and Tbx5, collectively known as GMT – into the damaged region of a heart and, within a month, the non-beating cells that normally ended up becoming scar tissue had become functioning heart cells that had integrated with their neighbors. “The factors get taken up by the fibroblasts and the non-muscle population of cells and they initiate a genome-wide switch of the program of the cells so that it now begins to activate thousands of muscle-specific genes and it turns off thousands of fibroblast genes.”

Srivastava’s direct reprogramming technique takes Yamanaka’s work further because it allows scientists to turn one type of cell into another without having to go through a stem cell phase in between, thus reducing the risk that any future therapy might induce cancer. The method has been proven to work, so far only in Petri dishes, for blood, liver and brain cells. “Ultimately, as we learn enough about each cell type, it’s likely we might be able to make most cell types in the body with this direct reprogramming approach,” he says.

The tough task for all these scientists – from those working specifically on the heart such as Riley to those working more generally on all cell types such as Srivastava – is to identify and catalogue the thousands of chemical factors that are at work in the various stages of cell development, and that are the keys to the transformation of one cell into another.

“We’re trying to do the same experiments we did in the heart in the pig’s heart because it is very similar in size and physiology to human hearts. If it works there and it is safe, then we’d be ready for a human clinical trial,” says Srivastava.

Like this:

Study: Stem cells from strangers can repair hearts

LOS ANGELES(AP) — Researchers are reporting a key advance in using stem cells to repair hearts damaged by heart attacks. In a study, stem cells donated by strangers proved as safe and effective as patients’ own cells for helping restore heart tissue.

The work involved just 30 patients in Miami and Baltimore, but it proves the concept that anyone’s cells can be used to treat such cases. Doctors are excited because this suggests that stem cells could be banked for off-the-shelf use after heart attacks, just as blood is kept on hand now.

The study used a specific type of stem cells from bone marrow that researchers believed would not be rejected by recipients. Unlike other cells, these lack a key feature on their surface that makes the immune system see them as foreign tissue and attack them, explained the study’s leader, Dr. Joshua Hare of the University of Miami.

The patients in the study had suffered heart attacks years earlier, some as long as 30 years ago. All had developed heart failure because the scar tissue from the heart attack had weakened their hearts so much that they grew large and flabby, unable to pump blood effectively.

Researchers advertised for people to supply marrow, which is removed using a needle into a hip bone. The cells were taken from the marrow and amplified for about a month in a lab at Baltimore’s Johns Hopkins University, then returned to Miami to be used for treatment, which did not involve surgery.

The cells were delivered through a tube pushed through a groin artery into the heart near the scarred area. Fifteen patients were given cells from their own marrow and 15 others, cells from strangers.

About a year later, scar tissue had been reduced by about one-third. Both groups had improvements in how far they could walk and in quality of life. There was no significant difference in one measure of how well their hearts were able to pump blood, but doctors hope these patients will continue to improve over time, or that refinements in treatment will lead to better results.

The big attraction is being able to use cells supplied by others, with no blood or tissue matching needed.

“You could have the cells ready to go in the blood bank so when the patient comes in for a therapy — there’s no delay,” Hare said. “It’s also cheaper to make the donor cells,” and a single marrow donor can supply enough cells to treat as many as 10 people.

“That opens up an entire new avenue for stem cell therapy, like a sophisticated version of a blood bank,” he said. There’s an advantage in not having to create a cell therapy for each patient, and it could spare them the pain and wait of having their own marrow harvested, he said.

The study was sponsored by the National Institutes of Health. Hare owns stock in a biotech company working on a treatment using a mixture of cells.

Juan Lopez received his own cells in the study, and said it improved his symptoms so much that at age 70, he was able to return to his job as an engineer and sales manager for a roofing manufacturer and ride an exercise bike.

“It has been a life-changing experience,” said Lopez, who lives in Miami. “I can feel day by day, week by week, month by month, my improvement. I don’t have any shortness of breath and my energy level is way up there. I don’t have any fluid in my lungs.

“Duke University researchers used molecules called microRNAs to convert scar tissue (called fibroblasts) into heart muscle cells in a living mouse”

That’s great! Unfortunately, the author of the article foolishly decided to pit “microRNA – The New Kid On The Block” against the decade long reigning champ, Adult Stem Cells…and he needs to get his story straight.

New Kids On The Block

From the start, the author presents almost no accurate information about adult stem cells, their decade of history, successes, studies, trials, patients treated, safety, efficacy and potency. He is incredibly dated on the understanding of adult stem cells and straight up wrong/ignorant on many of his points. His original 3 point comparison is to Embryonic stem cells, already shown to be far inferior to Adult Stem Cells in every way including their potency. He then states Adult Stem Cells have: “…a limited capacity to form other types of cells” which is completely wrong.

He then quotes the Duke University doctor, ‘The results of using these adult stem cells for tissue regeneration are “not as satisfying as one would like.”

A. “not as satisfying as one would like.” is perhaps the most unscientific assessment I’ve ever heard

B. I’m surprised to hear this from the doctor as Duke University has had tremendous success utilizing stem cells in treating pediatric Cerebral Palsy/Ataxia

D. Would he be satisfied if you could grow an entire heart from scratch, from a patients’ own stem cells? You can.

I suppose the author is not entirely to blame as the assertion within the peer reviewed article is completely erroneous as well: “this is the first report of direct cardiac reprogramming in vivo.” Wrong!

I would further question whether microRNA cells are “smart” like adult stem cells are. Gene therapy to turn heart muscle scar tissue into heart muscle is great but then you have a scar shaped piece of heart muscle. Does it beat in perfect time with the rest of the heart muscle or is it asynchronous? Can it grow an entirely new heart from scratch as adult stem cells can? (No, it can not)

An adult stem cell grows a cardiac cell from it’s proverbial birth and the cardiac cells conform from ‘birth’ and as they develop to the surrounding tissue and work in unison with the adjacent cells. It would appear the microRNA transforms the scar tissue at a later stage of the cells growth. This is then perhaps an “older cell” with it’s own inherent programming and limitations. Prone to it’s own agenda, these doppelganger heart cells may cause conflicts with the existing cells and the rest of the heart muscle.

Just changing scar to muscle is only a fraction of what stem cells can do. “Smart” adult stem cells will build the cells needed, put them in the places they are needed, create valves where valves are needed, capillaries if those are needed, bring dead heart tissue back to life and then some will migrate down to the pancreas and heal that as well.

microRNA gene therapy may have a long future of success and I am sure there are some applications which they will be great. To compare them to adult stem cells in the context of regenerative medicine as the author has done, especially without a proper understanding of the safety and efficacy record of adult stem cells, especially in the field of cardiac regenerative medicine which has a decade long history (the longest of all practical and clinical research), is like bringing a rubber knife to a gun fight.

Repairing the heart without using stem cells

By Alex Crees Published April 27, 2012 FoxNews.com

When a person suffers a heart attack, scar tissue forms over the damaged areas of the heart, reducing the organ’s function. However, in a recent study, scientists successfully turned this scar tissue into working heart muscle without the use of stem cells.

Duke University researchers used molecules called microRNAs to convert scar tissue (called fibroblasts) into heart muscle cells in a living mouse, improving the heart’s ability to pump blood.

According to the scientists, this process is much simpler than stem cell transplants and has none of the ethical concerns, making it a potential turning point in the science of tissue regeneration.

“Right now, there’s no good evidence stem cells can do the job,” senior author Dr. Victor Dzau, a James B. Duke professor of medicine and chancellor of health affairs at Duke University, told FoxNews.com.

Scientists believe embryonic stem cells are the best to use for tissue regeneration because they are pluripotent—meaning they can become any type of cell in the body. However, Dzau said there have not been enough experiments done to prove how functional the stem cells are in regenerating tissues and whether or not they may form deadly tumors.

Additionally, there are ethical concerns about using cells derived from a human embryo, he said.

Meanwhile, adult stem cells avoid the controversy surrounding embryonic stem cells but have a limited capacity to form other types of cells. The results of using these adult stem cells for tissue regeneration are “not as satisfying as one would like,” Dzau said.

Rather than stem cells, the new method developed by Dzau’s team uses microRNA molecules—which typically control gene activity—and delivers them into the scar tissue that develops after a heart attack. The microRNAs are able to reprogram, or trick, the scar tissue into becoming heart muscle again instead.

Testing is still in its early stages, but so far, the method appears to be relatively easy, and the data looks very promising, according to the researchers.

“It’s a much simplified, feasible way of causing regeneration; very easy to use as therapy,” Dzau said. “With stem cells, you have to take them from the embryo or tissue in the body, grow them in culture, and re-inject them—and then there can be technical and biological problems.

“With microRNA, after a heart attack you can simply convert some of the fibroblasts and tell them to become the right cell type and regenerate,” he said.

The method also has the potential to treat stroke, spinal cord injuries, chronic conditions such as heart disease—and even the normal damage that can come with aging. It can feasibly be used for any type of organ in the body, though the process of converting the cells may be different for each organ.

“Right now, our work is proof of concept,” Dzau said, adding that the method must still be tested in then larger animals, and if successful there, it can move onto human clinical trials. “But one could think about all these things of possibilities. Could you use it to treat the disease of aging and losing brain cells? Can you convert other cells in the brain to working brain cells?

“It’s a significant finding because it changes the way we think about regenerating tissues,” Dzau said. “It breaks open a whole new area.”

The study was funded in part by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute and published Thursday in the journal Circulation Research.

My buddy David S. is raising funds for stem cell treatment for his heart. He is a gentleman, a poet, a musician and he always seems to get right to the meat of the subject. David asks:

What was the method used to develop [adult stem cell] therapies all over the world in other countries? Clinical trials?

————————————————–

Excellent question!

Short answer: American medical professionals are so Ameri-centric, they throw away or ignore anything (studies, trials, etc) conducted outside the USA.

I remember a few years ago, an acquaintance of mine who was pre-med sneered at my mention of any trials conducted outside the US and then sneered at the very thought of adult stem cells doing anything. Well, I guess I’m laughing last but I brought up the point then that his arrogance was somewhat confusing to me since the USA health system is ranked 37th in the world by the World Health Organization. What the hell was he so proud of??

HERE’S WHAT HAPPENED…

in 2005 the first stem cell treatment facility was created in Thailand where the environment was favorable (the king’s cardio thoracic surgeon was a fan of stem cells for heart disease) and theIr methods were based on half a decade of human research preceded by years and years of animal research. I present a short list of the ‘ignored’ studies below. Read through and you will realize:

a. by the time these studies were published, everyone in the scientifically community new the results for a year or years and

b. by the time the Bangkok facility was created, Prof Doris Taylor was already creating hearts with stem cells from scratch

c. these studies and trials, when conducted outside the US, have been all but ignored and then repeated in the US. The inevitable successful trial results 6-8 years later in the US are always accompanied by an incorrect, ignorant and infuriating news article crying: “first ever in the world!”

d. in addition to the studies/trials below, there were also hundreds or thousands of other studies showing the safety and efficacy of adult stem cell treatments in animals and humans in other organs/parts of the body.

[While, ‘it worked there, so it will work here’ is not an accepted scientific method, at some point there is an increase in confidence when you realize: adult stem cells are in the body to repair, that’s what they do, they are safe, they fix stuff, now let’s figure out how to maximize there effects.]

A clinical trial led by Dr. Hans Dohmann plus six colleagues in Brazil took 21 transplant candidates and gave 14 of them bone marrow cells. The results were so spectacular that the American Heart Association accepted the paper and it was presented in 2003. Five of the seven in the control group opted in to make a total of 19 stem cell transplants. The mortality rate for transplant candidates is about 35% per year. At that rate there would be, of those 19, only 2.2 patients still alive without a transplant after five years. There were, in fact, 12 alive as of Dec. 31, 2007; more than five years down the road.

If you did not want or could not get a heart transplant (as is true of 90%+ of dying heart patients in North America) then you had to make a choice between stem cell treatment or standard Western Cardiology methodology.

Western Cardiology methodology kept 12% of patients (waiting for heart transplants) alive for five years.

Adult/repair Stem cell treatments kept 63% of patients (waiting for heart transplants) alive for five years. More than 5 times more heart transplant candidates lived for 5 years with stem cell treatments than the typical heart transplant recipient! Btw, stem cell science has made huge advancements in treating heart disease over the past seven years.

Dr. Amit Patel of Pittsburgh completed two of the most successful trials ever. In Uruguay, he proved, on a group of ischemic heart failure patients, that a bypass plus cells was infinitely better than a bypass only. That same year, TheraVitae, in Israel, developed a new, powerful blood-derived stem cell and dared to treat the sickest patients no clinical trial (except Brazil) would consider.

One of the Brazilians, Dr. Perin, came to Texas, used the Brazil results to get the first ASC heart clinical trial approved by the FDA. Over a dozen such approvals were granted in the next 12-18 months.

The first-ever commercial stem cell treatment center in the world starts adult stem cell treatment of hundreds of human patients. Results are amazing and include the regrowing of cardiac muscle tissue in patients, significant increases and sometimes a doubling of ejection fractions (the % volume of blood the heart can pump out per beat), etc! Stem cells are also recognized as “smart,” going to where they were needed most, creating micro-vessel bypasses around existing blockages areas, areas that previously were blocked and in areas where stents were implanted.

2005

Dr Taylor removed all cells from rat hearts except for a thin skeleton of tissue translucent as wax paper. She then injected the scaffold with fresh Cardiac Repair Stem Cells from newborn rats. Four days later, “We could see these little areas that were beginning to beat. By eight days, we could see the whole heart beating.” The experiment, reported in the journal Nature Medicine, marked the first time scientists created a functioning heart in the lab from biological tissue.

ADULT STEM CELLS vs. HEART DISEASE – UNDENIABLE SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE

HEART DISEASE TRIAL – 2004 to 2006 –

Clinical trial illustrates the safety and efficacy of VesCell Adult Stem Cell treatment. Accepted by the American Heart Assn in 2005-6. This trial was a key element in attaining regulatory approval for the treatment protocol that improved the lives of 300 mostly “no-option” heart patients.

BRITISH JOURNAL OF HAEMOTOLOGY – 2006

Research paper shows that peripheral blood derived stem cells can differentiate into a variety of other stem cells (angiogenic, myocardial and neural lineages) and do so in sufficient quantities to use as autologous treatment for a variety of diseases.

Shows the safety, and feasibility and enhancement of limb salvage from implantation of non-mobilized peripheral blood angiogenic cell precursors (NMPB-ACPs) in 80% of patients with critical limb ischemia (CLI) who were poor candidates for standard revascularization treatment options.

BIOPROCESSING JOURNAL – 2007

Bioprocessing Journal scientific paper shows the consistent and reliable manufacturing procedure utilized for transforming bone marrow and blood-derived stem cells into angiogenic cell precursors (ACPs) and hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) cellular products for the treatment of severe heart diseases. End product was found to be a) safe and effective; b) prepared from non-mobilized peripheral blood; c) stable, with a relatively long shelf-life; and d) ready-to-use and easily utilized by the physician.

Like this:

…

A STEM CELL LOVE STORY

BETWEEN MAN, WOMAN & GOD

…

One of the most moving love stories I’ve seen

in a very long time.

…

Imagine Romeo and Juliette recast with clergy and separated not by feuding families but by their life-long religious vows to God. Throw in not one but 2 third act heart attacks and the standard doctor’s refrain:

“there’s nothing more we can do.”

Add the stem cell treatment twist at the finale; allowing for an extended encore of life and love extending years beyond prognosis.

John Fugelsang recalls…his mother, Peggy, joined a convent after an abusive childhood, taking the name Sister Damien. But his father, Jack, had become a Franciscan monk after high school. The two met in Brooklyn when Jack – or Brother Boniface – had become ill with tuberculosis.

“From all accounts I heard, he fell madly, desperately, insanely in love with this Southern nurse in a nun’s habit that he knew he could never have, and had sworn to God he would never want to have,” Fugelsang says.

Brother Boniface did the only thing he could do. He held a secret torch for Sister Damien for some 10 years. During that time, he expressed his love through platonic letters. She had been sent to Malawi to care for people with leprosy. And every week, he would write. He kept her – and all of the sisters – apprised of the latest: of L.B.J. and M.L.K. and everything else U.S.A.

Then, her father died. When she returned home to take care of her family, Brother Boniface found out and intercepted her – showing up at the hospital where she was working and professing his love. “She was appalled,” says Fugelsang.

But eventually, Boniface won her over. They broke their religious vows and made new ones – to each other.

As Fugelsang says, it was their first love and second marriage, the first being a marriage to God. They dropped their names and became Jack and Peggy again. They had kids and lived happily married for decades, from what Fugelsang recalls.

“I can honestly say that my father’s love only grew as he got older and as they aged,” says Fugelsang. “The romance didn’t slow down for him at all. He was someone who was completely unable to separate his devotion to God from his devotion to his wife.”

Well into his 60s, Jack’s heart thumped at full force – emotionally and spiritually. But then, two heart attackshad doctors shaking their heads, saying

there was nothing they could do.

“So he just began telling everyone that he wasn’t going to die,” says Fugelsang, “that he was going to live on because he was too in love. And he held on longer than any of the doctors thought he could.”

A stem-cell treatment in Thailand afforded him a few more years.

“It was amazing seeing how even in the last days of his life, the love just got deeper and deeper. I have photos of him in his hospital bed looking at her with a kind of naked, calm love that I’ve seldom seen on a man’s face.”

7 long years.

It has taken 7 years for the US medical system to CATCH UP to the rest of the world. This article, though pro-adult stem cell, uses the same tired, B.S. lines like:

“This is the first instance of therapeutic regeneration”

This article blatantly ignores the thousands of of studies, trials and patients successfully treated over the last 7 years. Sadly, we won’t see stem cell treatments readily, commonly and commercially available in the US for a long time.

Many people will offer comments on these developments…

The uninformed will say: “first time ever!”

The optimists will say: “better late than never”

The realists will say: “10 years before US patients will have access to these treatments”

The families of those who have died over the past 7 years will say: “if only the US woke up sooner”

……………………

Stem cell treatments are available NOW outside of the United States at some of the most modern and advanced hospitals and clinics in the world. Maybe, just maybe, the families of those who WILL die from heart disease over the NEXT 10 years will say:

“NOW is the time to go where they have been treating heart disease with stem cells for over half a decade”

For info on CURRENTLY AVAILABLE stem cell treatments for heart disease:

A patient’s own heart cells can be used to regrow new heart tissue and help undo damage caused by a heart attack, according to early research published on Monday.

Scientists at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles and Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore were able to treat 17 heart attack patients with cells grown from their own heart tissue and not only show the procedure was safe, but also that the cells can help reduce scarring and even cause new heart muscle to grow.

When a person suffers a heart attack, he or she is often left with huge areas of scarring in the heart. Scarred heart muscle doesn’t pump blood as well as it used to, putting stress on other parts of the heart to make up for the deficit. The damaged area also doesn’t conduct electric current as well, leading to an abnormal heart rhythm, which can cause more problems. Heart attack patients often go on to develop heart failure.

“This is the first instance of therapeutic regeneration,” says Dr. Eduardo Marbán, director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute. He says while nature abounds with examples of spontaneous regeneration of limbs or tissues – like a salamander’s new tail or a human liver regrowing to full size if partially damaged – doctors have not been able to help patients regrow heart tissue. This could change in the future if larger clinical trials and longer patient outcomes confirm the results of this early research published Monday in the journal The Lancet. Marbán and his colleagues first presented this research at an American Heart Associationconference in November…